Some days are more fun than others. The first part of Monday was fine; we met our new client and got a good start on the job. It was less fun when Annie ate rat poison. Luckily, Judy saw her do it, got her to stop, and cleared all the unswallowed poison out of her mouth. Within fifteen minutes, we had Annie to the vet, and the vet had given her a shot to induce vomiting. Most of the poison got out before it made it into her system. D-con rat poison thins the blood so it won’t clot. Annie will be on blood thickening, clotting, medication for the next few weeks, just in case. Judy and Annie settled in for a quiet recuperation back at the motorhome and I went back to work, but then Judy tried to knock herself out by accidentally walking into one of the motorhome slides while she was outside. She didn’t actually knock herself out, but she did knock herself down. Left a mark. Mild concussion, taking a few days to resolve. A while back, Skip asked us to keep track of all the mistakes that can be made while motorhoming, so he’d have a complete list of things to avoid. Well Skip, we’re still working on it. Life on the road.
Cortez
Of course the stop at Cortez last week means a cart ride with Bernie.
Sunday
Travel day. Ridgway to Craig. Pretty much straight north for two hundred miles. Still in Colorado. Nice drive. Here for a new client starting tomorrow. We spent last week in pinon juniper/riparian. Saw a lot of different kinds of birds, fifty altogether. Now we’ve gone this far north and guess what…. we’re in pinon juniper/riparian. No juniper titmouse yet, but we’ll keep looking.
Fishing
The downhill trail to the stream, through the meadow, degenerates to a push through willows to get to the water. The weather warm, the sky blue. The sound of the stream and the repeating call of the spotted sandpiper echo off the rock wall opposite. Catching and releasing rainbow trout in a pool so still and clear you can watch the fish rise, not to the fly on the surface, but to the nymph dropped two feet below. Fish within our sight, holding behind underwater structure, watching for their favorite food to drift by, some choosing what we offer instead. Fish farther out, fish we can’t see from where we stand, responding the same, when we cast our flies to the other side of the stream to float to them in a similar fashion. Sometimes nothing works. Sometimes everything works. As the evening progressed, a beaver surfaced, circled, eyed us squarely from that broad head, turned away, slapped the water hard with his tail, a sound like a boulder being thrown into the water with both hands, and dove. It was his turn in the pond, but we didn’t leave. He did it again. We stayed. After six times we left. We moved downstream and fished some different water. Sploosh! He did it again. Every pond in the stream was his. Our time was up. An experience to remember.
Ridgway
Our front yard.